


Lethargy

by abluemountainashtardis



Series: Mercury Veins [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Frontotemporal Dementia, Gen, Young Stiles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-14
Updated: 2017-08-14
Packaged: 2018-12-15 11:25:43
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11805042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abluemountainashtardis/pseuds/abluemountainashtardis
Summary: A lack of energy and enthusiasm





	Lethargy

  
You see the thing is, Stiles can count the number of times his dad has mentioned his mother sober on his hands. Eight. When they go to the graveyard once a year. Every other time he's drunk or starts to drink in the middle of the conversation.

So Stiles stopped mentioning his mom, and his dad let him.

There are photos - in a box, in the attic, in the junk heap, at the back, in the crawl space. He remembers because when they eventually tidied mom's things away he was the one who helped pack the important stuff into those boxes and passed them to his dad to stack.

He knows where to look, he's just never wanted to. He knows what's in those boxes and it's not much. It certainly meant nothing to a nine year old and he can't remember anything standing out.

So no, he's never felt the urge to talk about his mother and remember her because what he remembers is tainted and wrong and confusing, even now it's still confusing.

It's a slow disease, and it starts with changes in behaviour.

Small changes. Getting angry at little things. Needing quiet. Impulsiveness. Stopping hobbies. Losing tact and empathy.

It starts with slapping your kid because he's being a hyperactive little bastard.

It progresses without treatment because that hyperactive little bastard doesn't tell his dad about it. Not the cruel words, or the smacks, or the sheer emotional abuse his mother puts him through, because it's normal, because he's six, because it's his mom and he trusts her. He deserves it for putting his mother through all that stress in the first place.

Even when she tells him he's a little shit who is driving her mad.

And hey, turns out she was right.

So when he's seven and his dad hears his mom thanking the babysitter for putting up for such an annoying asshole then insulting her general appearance before slamming the door in the crying girl's face all the little warning signs come together for the detective and Stiles was sent to Scott's for a month.

When he came back home he was told his mother was sick in her head and didn't have long to live.

Soon she forgets more than just the little pockets of time. Soon she's in the hospital for care and treatment. She's asking for her baby. Screaming they've taken her baby away. Loose phrases in some other language. She gets paranoid and irratic and violent and immobile. Stiles was terrified of his mother, completely petrified by what she said, how she acted, who she was.

The last thing Stiles remembers of his mother is sitting next to her reading out children's book. She couldn't read much, couldn't talk much, didn't recognise him but looked at him with this strange look on her face.

"Brawd," she said softly, reaching out and placing a hand on his cheek. "Mab?"

Then she seized. Then she died.

His dad arrived hours later. Then hours later they went home.

His dad doesn't drink because he misses his wife, he drinks because he missed his kid being abused by his wife.

And that kills him. So Stiles doesn't mention his mom. Doesn't ask about her. Doesn't remind him of her. Doesn't look at her stuff in the attic.

But...

Topezuvjw

He's googled it. He's looked. It's a surname and from what he can tell it's russian. It's confusing. It's one of the two names his mother gave him. The other was Beynon - which was another surname and welsh.

Now he has a picture with a man who has a name like his. A russian welsh fusion. With the same surname as his first name.

Stiles takes a snapshot of the photo and runs it through google images, it comes up with nothing which is what he expected. He's going to have to go into the attic. He's going to have to dig.

Or he could just ignore it and bury it deep. He's good at that. Ignoring a problem until it goes away.

+

It was a small box full of poloroids, little scraps of paper, drawings, recipies. It was the box his dad used to store things early on when she was still at home to help her remember things. His dad would send him to play while they would sit and spread it on the kitchen table in silence. Dad would talk about the photos Stiles was in and his mother would draw faces that his dad pleaded for his mother to name. She was always silent.

"Claudia, soon you might not know who these people are."

He was nearly eight and hiding behind the wall listening to his father talking, dressed in his pyjamas, his toy dragon in his hand, ear being chewed off by Stiles' nervous gnawing.

"You don't need to tell me, but write it down, on the back of these drawings maybe? I won't read them, not ever. I won't let anyone read them. Not even Stiles. I'll destroy them, I promise, but please..."

Stiles sneaked a peek around the door frame. His dad clasping his mom's arm, looking tired and desperate. His dad spotted him. He sighed.

"Come here, champ, it's bedtime for you anyway," he said holding out his hands. Stiles ran to him skittishly, letting his dad pick him up and sit him on his lap. "Gonna give your mom a kiss?"

Stiles pressed into his dad's shoulder and shook his head.

"Is Puff going to give her a kiss?"

Stiles considered his dragon's feelings before nodding and sticking out his stuffed animal. His mom smiled and gave Puff a kiss.

"Goodnight Puff. Goodnight sweet heart, your mama loves you and is trying to get better."

Stiles burrowed into his father's side as he stood, lifting his son easily. "You brushed your teeth?"

Stiles nodded. "Yup, I brushed my teeth and got my jamas and got Puff and tidied the toys out my bed and onto the floor."

His dad snorted. "Tidied, huh? Am I going to stand on anything in there, kiddo?"

"Nu uh, I tidied them into under the bed, Daddy."

"Well that's alright then," he replied pushing open Stiles' bedroom door and lying Stiles onto the bed. "Would you like your night light?"

"That's okay, I'm bigger now," Stiles said. "And I got Puff."

His dad smiled and tucked Stiles in. "That's very true," he said. "I'll tuck Puff in next to you, okay?"

"Okay, Daddy."

"Who loves you?" his dad chanted.

"Moma and Daddy," Stiles replied by rote.

"Yes we do," he said running a hand over Stiles hair. "And what's our new rule."

"If Moma does something that momas shouldn't do we tell on her."

"That's right, son," he said kissing him on the forehead. "Now close your eyes, then go to sleep, and I will see you, when you wake."

Just another one of those fragments in his life that didn't make sense. Now he was sitting at that same kitchen table starting to spread out the same photos, an echo, a bit of history repeating itself.

The photos had no order to them. There were lots of snaps of him. Oh look, naked baby photo. Naked toddler photo. Great. Naked bathtime photo. Naked in a hat. What was it with parents taking naked baby photos?

Then there were the drawings. His mother's. Shaky. They must have been from after her motor skills were affected.

Stiles rubbed at his eyes. God he could see why his father drank.

Wedding photos. Hands with the rings, the signing of the certificate, their faces framed with smiles and white shimmering veils, a kiss, mother of the groom, a few of the deputies who were murdered by Matt. It didn't look big and grand. It looked small and contained. In fact everyone who was there had now died except his father.

Now he really needed a drink.

There's one or two tiny wallet photos, crinkled and faded. One is of two children with their faces worn away, they're hugging and happy. The other is of an older man and woman, they're posing for the shot. They look stern and unyeilding and perhaps a bit wild somehow.

Stiles pulls out the Argent wedding party photo and squints at both of the photos. The photos are so tiny that Stiles can't be sure, but maybe the same man is in both photos.

He's going to need a magnifying glass - like Sherlock.

Stiles sighs and packs away the box, uncertain of what would happen if his father found him digging through his mom's things - things he promised to destroy. Why would he promise that? Why? Why did Argents have his name written in a wedding photo?

Not for the first time he couldn't ignore it.


End file.
